Marketing Fruit 309 



putting out an extremely fancy pack, this is true only 

 of a comparatively small number of cars. These cars 

 of fancy fruit are supposed to be used as advertising 

 to promote land sales, and though sold at high prices, 

 the growers actually lose money on such fruit. This, it 

 is argued, must be true, as such strict grading results in 

 many culls that can be marketed only at low prices. 

 It is also said that the markets are flooded with the 

 inferior grades, resulting in demoralized prices for all. 

 The writers have investigated these charges and fail to 

 find any evidence to sustain them, so far as the prominent 

 associations are concerned. Statistics of fruit shipments 

 from such associations as Hood River, Yakima, and Wen- 

 atchee do not indicate that these localities have been 

 responsible for flooding markets with fruit either good or 

 bad. It must be remembered that these regions are 

 comparatively new, and that while a large acreage of 

 orchard has been planted, the shipments are, as yet, com- 

 paratively small. It is safe to say that as soon as well- 

 regulated fruit-growers' associations market the bulk of 

 the crop, we will hear less about glutted markets and de- 

 moralizing effects of inferior grades of fruit. 



Methods and Results in Association Work 



There are several systems used by associations to insure 

 the proper packing and grading of fruit. (1) With the 

 older system the association does all the packing, usually 

 at their packing houses, the growers delivering the fruit 

 just as it is taken from the trees. Here the packers, 

 under the direction of a superintendent, sort the fruit 

 into grades, and at the same time pack it into boxes or 



